travel ❖ adventure ❖ random thoughts

February 24, 2017

Two Left Feet

What a great week it has been! Everything about it has been fantastic, for the most part. For some reason, though, I all of a sudden forgot how to walk for a few days this week. My two left feet were not cooperating with my brain and I have no explanation for it, whatsoever. I have been wearing the same pairs of shoes so nothing there has changed. But, seriously, I would be walking down the sidewalk and all of a sudden my ankle would role, (that happened, I think, a total of three times, one of which I caught myself before I completely fell, in front of large crowds of people each time), and a countless number of times I just tripped over my toes while walking. I’m just going to blame it on the uneven sidewalks here… even though I have been walking fine on them for the four weeks prior to this one… but SSHHHHH!

To go along with this, I couldn’t tell you how many times I have rear ended people while walking this week. And yes, it was an accident each time. Like, I would just be walking and all I had to do is blink and someone would be stopped in front of me. One of those times I was stopped to cross a crosswalk and I turned my head to the left to see if any cars were coming (before I jaywalked), and I turned back around and there was a little lady standing on the curb just in front of me. Oops. It’s not like I pushed her at all, just a little bump enough for her to have to step forward. We both stepped to the left as she went to look behind at me and I bumped into her, again. She started laughing so hard and I apologized and she said, “Oh, no worries,” while she continued to chuckle. As long as nobody got hurt, right?

The Dublin Chamber of Commerce, the awesome place where I intern, is really quite an awesome place to intern. I think I have mentioned it before, but the chamber hosts over 100 events each year for its members, two of those being this week. Wednesday morning there was a presentation based on strategic thinking in business. There were amazing speakers that did a really great job of getting the message through to all who attended. And might I just mention that I had a name badge made for me to wear around during events and, man, it makes me feel legit.

I previously mentioned the croissants I ate last week. Well, either my work hates me and thinks I am too skinny or they love me and want to give me all the free food they can. Each of the three days I worked this week I received free food. Two of the days I had croissants and the other I had a tray of leftover sandwiches and wraps left on my desk. Obviously they were for everyone to share, but they were left on my desk and I was told I was in charge of them.

There are three categories of members: small to medium, business, and corporate. The event on Thursday morning was mainly aimed at the corporate level members, meaning CEO’s, COO’s, CFO’s, you get the idea. So, I dressed a little fancier, brown shoes, dark pants, brown belt, white shirt, a weird tie, and an ugly grey blazer. I got so many compliments on my outfit that day and I don’t mean to brag, but damn is that a confidence booster. It just goes to show how far simple compliments can go; people really appreciate them. Anyway, the speaker presented on how to effectively network to a bunch of professional strangers in a room and I learned so much. I took notes and published it as a blog on the chamber’s website. You can click here to view it, if you so please. It’s fine if you don’t, though. I understand.

I had a few meetings with colleagues this week, as well, all of which went really well. I learned about a few different departments of the chamber and what each one does, specifically. I also had a great talk with one of my supervisors as we were walking back to our office from a client meeting we had a few blocks over, and she told me she is surprised because I am such a fast learner. She told me that past interns had to ask a million questions before they got the hang of tasks. So, I guess I’m doing all right in that sense.

I also learned that when someone says they’re “high as a kite,” it means that they are high on caffeine from all the tea and coffee they’ve drank. It has somewhat of a different meaning than it does in the States.

I’ll leave you with this from one of the speakers on Wednesday.

“Stop being afraid of a technologically advanced world. We need to start immersing ourselves in it because it is no longer just our future, it’s our present.”